User talk:Lightmouse

Edmonton municipal election, 1963

This is the sixth time that you've made that edit, and this is the fourth time I've come to your talk page asking you to stop making it. I am at a loss as to how to proceed. Suggestions? Sarcasticidealist (talk) 20:12, 5 December 2008 (UTC)

Why wouldn't these edits constitute edit warring? Tennis expert (talk) 10:50, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Tennis expert, how could something so trivial in such a trivial article constitute edit warring. Lightmouse puts so much effort and skill into improving articles that it would be obscenely out of balance to call this "edit warring". I'm thinking of listing the article for deletion. How is it notable? Tony (talk) 15:14, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

In case nobody has noticed, the whole category of 97 articles is owned by User:Sarcasticidealist. That kind of explains why he is being so very defensive. Ohconfucius (talk) 15:45, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Break out the torches and pitchforks! Hilarious. Just because an editor contributes heavily to a specific category of article doesn't mean they're trying to own them. Maybe try some WP:AGF? Not everyone is a date-link supporting fiend and your lack of civility is troubling. —Locke Cole • t • c 02:03, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Where does the edit warring policy exempt so-called "trivial" edits from its prohibition? What makes this edit warring even worse is that Lightmouse is using AWB to edit war, often making several edits per minute. He should refresh himself about the AWB rules of use. Tennis expert (talk) 07:43, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

The issue here is that the figures being converted are part of a direct quote, which is extremely difficult to justify. Lightmouse, I would most strongly suggest that you find a way to detect <blockquote>, {{cquote}} and similar quoting systems, and make absolutely no changes to anything inside them. In this situation, Sarcasticidealist does appear to simply be preserving the integrity of the article, not edit warring. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 23:28, 6 December 2008 (UTC)

Indeed; I think Lightmouse realises this. For the huge improvement that he makes in the project, these occasional false-positives a small price to pay. Locke Cole, you might consider trying a friendly, non-belligerent approach. You might be surprised at the pay-off, even with people who have a different take on dates and linking. Tony (talk) 02:12, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

"[F]riendly, non-belligerent approach"? Ironic advice, indeed, from someone threatening a POINTY AFD, wouldn't you think? — Bellhalla (talk) 15:47, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

That's certainly true, but if such detection is possible, then that is yet another group which loses their vocal opposition to his activities. If it is possible to reduce false positives (and in this case, it shouldn't be hard), then by all means, do so. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 03:22, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Huntster, you don't happen to know the magic string that would enable such avoidance by a script, do you? Tony (talk) 09:50, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Nope, but I don't program bots. It should be as simple as an If-then-else type thing...If <blockquote> exists, then stop, etc etc. There are plenty of bot operators around that can answer such questions. — Huntster (t • @ • c) 10:07, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

A few points:

• I have no strong views on date delinking, and don't really follow the debate. Accordingly, I have no views on Lightmouse's activities on that front, and view this as a totally separate issue.
• Bots are going to generate false positives. I get that, and have said as much in my previous messages to Lightmouse. I'm not asking for false positives to get eliminated; I'm just asking them to be limited to one per article. Once Lightmouse makes a mistake on one article, he should take some sort of measure to make sure that that mistake isn't repeated. I don't think that's unreasonable.
• With regards to the charges of OWNership, I don't think they're fair. I wrote those articles early in my Wikipedia career, before I knew much about the relevant style conventions. A lot of them have had edits made since that improve the articles, and I've had no complaints. I complain only when an editor repeats the same patently inappropriate edits six times on the same article.
• I don't think this is edit-warring; Lightmouse has acknowledged in the past that this particular edit isn't appropriate, so I'm basically reverting it with his consent. Sarcasticidealist (talk) 16:03, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

Sarcasticidealist, I am sorry to have added a conversion in round brackets (parentheses). I agree that quotes should be treated differently from normal text and there are various methods (square brackets, footnotes, rephrasing to avoid the quoted unit, etc). The edit was done using AWB and in AWB it is technically simply to exclude a page that contains term 'blockquote'. I may have to do that but to date, I have not done so. That may seem strange but it is for the following reasons:

Firstly it will prevent valid edits being made to non-quote parts of articles. Secondly, there are many types of false positive. For the 'principle editor' of an article, it is a big annoyance. In this case, it has happened six times and that is even worse. Each false positive has a slightly different rate of incidence, a slightly different effect on the reader, and a slightly different volume of the complaint. Each mechanism to avoid a type of false positive comes at a different cost and a different success rate. A janitorial editor that wishes to avoid false positives can accumulate, like coral, so many different mechanisms that the efficiency/effort ratio reduces drastically. So the human inclination is to focus on false positive avoidance mechanisms that are most statistically worthwhile. That is not an excuse for regarding any false positive as acceptable, but it is an explanation of the reality that faces any editor that does half a million edits.

Both the AWB code and the monobook script will not add a conversion where there is already a conversion in square brackets. That is a very common practice for quotes with many advantages and is what I recommend. It would solve it. Lightmouse (talk) 11:51, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Using AWB to make controversial edits

Why are you continuing to use AWB to make controversial edits, e.g., date delinking? Tennis expert (talk) 19:30, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Why are you meddling in other people's business asking annoying questions about oft-discussed issues when you are not even active on Wikipedia? Dabomb87 (talk) 22:26, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

"Other people's business," huh? Wow, that's an unusual perspective about Wikipedia. Tennis expert (talk) 23:26, 8 December 2008 (UTC)

Good point. Rephrased my comment. You like? Dabomb87 (talk) 02:05, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Your opinion that a question is "annoying" does not make it so. Think about it for a while. Tennis expert (talk) 04:24, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

To answer the stupid question with a stupid answer: it's a damned site easier than delinking articles manually one at a time. ;-) Ohconfucius (talk) 03:18, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Have you read the rules of use lately concerning WP:AWB? Tennis expert (talk) 04:24, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Tennis expert, based on the overwhelming preliminary results of these two RFCs, it seems a stretch to continue maintaining that date unlinking is controversial. — Bellhalla (talk) 05:24, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Deprecation does not mean go out and immediately start unlinking everything. If that's what people supported then the language should have been "Do you support editors/bots/scripts going out and unlinking all dates?", not "Do you support deprecation of date links?". Deprecation means stop using but leave existing uses in place. That's all that has consensus, but somehow that's been overlooked... —Locke Cole • t • c 05:38, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

< BIG YAWN > Ohconfucius (talk) 05:57, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

An RFC ends when it ends, not before. This is a simple concept that I'm surprised so many people want to ignore. Tennis expert (talk) 05:58, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

<BIGGER YAWN> There are so many important things for you guys to do on WP; please support our drive to strengthen wikilinking through smart linking. Tony (talk) 14:43, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Bogus edit summaries and abuse of automated bot

I have been informed that you are the User responsible for a script used by Admins, so I repost this request here:

Please desist from using an automated bot to remove links to England, Scotland and Wales. The edit summary you employ cites "wp:overlink", however this is utterly bogus, as WP:OVERLINK states very clearly: "It is not necessary to link to very large geographic features that are known worldwide, such as continents and very large countries." England, Scotland and Wales all clearly fail that criterion. Thank you in advance. --Mais oui! (talk) 07:40, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Heh, it's not referring to geographic area! --Closedmouth (talk) 08:02, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Please clarify: what is "not referring to geographic area"?--Mais oui! (talk) 08:16, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

The whole guideline is about which words need and don't need to be linked. If something is universally known to speakers of a certain language, (and we can assume that people who speak English know about England, and that if they don't, they'll probably be searching for it rather than stumbling across a link and thinking to themselves, "I wonder what 'England' means"), the word doesn't need to be linked. The logic there is, if something is well know, it probably doesn't need to be linked, but how do you define "well known"? You can see where I'm going with this. Do you advocate the delinking of the word "Russia"? --Closedmouth (talk) 08:24, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Certainly not! "Russia" suffers from the same problem as "England" - superficially very familiar, but in reality a term which many English-speakers grossly misunderstand.--Mais oui! (talk) 08:27, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

I guess I should make it clear I don't advocate the mass-delinking of terms like "England" (like I do with dates), but I do think the central concept of the guideline is very sound. --Closedmouth (talk) 08:29, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Good. We are agreed then: 1. the guideline is good; and 2. let's not mass de-link countries that fail the wp:overlink criterion. So, why then are admins using this script to do just that: mass-delinking terms like "England"?--Mais oui! (talk) 08:33, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Ack, that's a bad edit, and I don't think the script should be used for that specific purpose. I use it for cleaning up dates, and only cleaning up dates. So I can't answer your question, but I am now a little concerned :-/ --Closedmouth (talk) 08:39, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Unfortunately that edit is very, very far from an isolated incident. During the past year or so England especially, but also Scotland, has been mass-delinked on an alarming scale (often using this Lightmouse script), eg. I recently had to relink it in the lead sentence of the English language article. And how about this edit? Fair enough, the English psyche link was perhaps not essential, but de-linking the countries and glibbly claiming that a ref probably exists, somewhere, are totally unacceptable in my opinion. --Mais oui! (talk) 08:59, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

mercy: what are the chances that readers of the English-language Wikipedia are unfamiliar with what England, Scotland and/or Wales might refer to? Sssoul (talk) 08:11, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

The "chances" are vast, considering that awareness of the differences between England/GB/UK is very poor in England-itself, let alone the wider planet. Scotland may be quite well-known among native English-speakers, but it certainly fails the "very large countries" criterion. And Wales?? You have to be kidding. Very very few normal (ie. non-Wikipedia/academic types) people outside the UK have ever even heard of Wales (English speakers or otherwise), let alone know anything about it. --Mais oui! (talk) 08:20, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Who among English-speakers do not know what "England" is? It would also be hard to find someone who had never heard of Scotland or Wales. The notion of smart linking is based on the idea that our brilliant wikilinking provides the opportunity to funnel readers towards high-value links. Part of our service, as writers and editors, is to funnel them the right way and to avoid the dilution of those links. Every additional link comes at a slight cost, and this adds up. Tony (talk) 09:06, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Admiral Horatio Nelson for one, and (arguably) Winston Churchill too: "There is a forgotten, nay almost forbidden word that means more to me than any other word. That word is England." Other examples, especially from non-Yookaynians, are legion.--Mais oui! (talk) 09:11, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

(<-) Just voicing my opinion that I belive Mais oui! is wrong here, and that the script is a good thing; delinking common words. I suspect this objection is more to do with up-playing England and Scotland over the United Kingdom. I see no reason why we need these terms linked a billion times over - in some cases in a single article alone! --Jza84 |  Talk  14:41, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Indeed, the number of times I've encountered articles with "United States" or "Australia" linked up to seven times is dizzying. Tony (talk) 14:52, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

We are not talking about de-linking the US or Australia. My objection is to users like Jza84 using bogus Edit summaries citing wp:overlink to de-link Eng, Irl, Scot and Wales, when wp:overlink supports no such action. Please reply to what I actually wrote. --Mais oui! (talk) 14:58, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Here we go again with Tony and his own agenda regarding linking in WP just as he did with the dates. I will say again what I said before, WP is NOT a paper encyclopedia and there is nothing wrong with linking to other articles regardless of the value. Just because you don't want to click on the England link to learn more about it doesn't mean other readers won't. Just because I have heard of England or Scotland doesn't mean I know enough to relate it to the article I am reading. If we continue to delink everyting in WP then its just another encyclopedia liek all the ones at the bookstores only bigger.--Kumioko (talk) 17:19, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

My main objection is not the mass de-linking per se (although I do not support the mass de-linking campaign), it is the utterly bogus reference to WP:OVERLINK in the Edit summary. Nothing in WP:OVERLINK supports the de-linking of Scotland, Wales or Ireland, and it is very, very debateable whether WP:OVERLINK supports the de-linking of England either. --Mais oui! (talk) 17:28, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Have I been misled?

The reason that I commented here in the first place was that User:Jza84 left the following on my Talk page (the highlighted bold is added by myself):

I'm not using a bot. I'm using an admin and consensus-approved script, one of the most widely such used ones. I will continue to use it.
If you have issue with it I suggest you take it up with User:Lightmouse, its main developer. I am by no means the only user; this is part of a toolbox used by hundreds of users.
I have no way of changing its content, whilst the edit summary is automated.

Upon reviewing the replies given above, I am coming to the conclusion that I have been misled/lied to. Is it possible for individual users of the script to change its content? The reply by User:Closedmouth that a certain edit was "bad" implies that this was a parameter set by that individual user, not by User:Lightmouse. And is the edit summary "automated", or can users edit the edit summary, eg. to cite wp:overlink? --Mais oui! (talk) 08:26, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Individual users cannot change the script. The script is merely a tool that editors can choose to use. If you don't like a particular edit, you need to discuss that with the editor that made the edit rather than discussing it here. Lightmouse (talk) 08:34, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

So, it is you that has been responsible for the mass de-linking of Wales, Scotland, Ireland and England!! I request that you change the script immediately to remove Eng, Scot, Irl and Wales, because WP:OVERLINK states very clearly: "It is not necessary to link to very large geographic features that are known worldwide, such as continents and very large countries." Wales, Scotland, Ireland and England all fail that criterion (for slightly different reasons). Yet another "bad edit" (Closedmouth's description, not mine.)--Mais oui! (talk) 08:57, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

You are mistaken. I am not responsible for edits done by other editors. If you don't like an edit done by somebody, that is between you and them. Lightmouse (talk) 08:59, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Now I really am confused. User:Jza84 refers me to User:Lightmouse, but User:Lightmouse refers me to User:Jza84. Do you see the problem here?

Will somebody please take responsibility. Is that too much to ask?

Are you telling me that it is User:Jza84 who added the parameters England; Scotland; Wales to the tool? Cos he said that it was not him but rather a big boy who done it and then ran away.--Mais oui! (talk) 09:05, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

It is very simple. If 'Jza84' made an edit that you don't like, revert it and/or debate it with 'Jza84'. If you and he cannot agree on the principles of linking, then try the styleguide talk pages. I don't want to get involved in your dispute. Lightmouse (talk) 09:23, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Thank you. So, I was misled. IMHO User:Jza84 should have authority to use this script withdrawn until he agrees not to abuse the privilege. I am not holding my breath. I have been around long enough to know how things work around here, and I ain't on the right e-mail lists. Ha det bra. --Mais oui! (talk) 09:27, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Admin advice required

Right, User:Jza84 refuses to discuss his use of the Lightmouse script at either his or my Talk. He refers me here, but you refer me back to him. He reverts my edits without the courtesy of an Edit summary (eg), and he continues to parade around de-linking countries not covered by wp:overlink, using the Lightmouse script (eg). Now he just threatens to block me to shut me up. When, exactly, will Admins begin to take some responsibility for one of their own? --Mais oui! (talk) 12:11, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Lightmouse has written some brilliant scripts, some of which I use -although I do not use the one which you are referring to, which is 'delink common terms'. I agree with LM: each editor takes a tool and uses it much like the US' right to bear arms. Don't blame the constitution if someone uses a weapon inappropriately. LM just makes the tools available. Editors are responsible because they are the ones who press the 'save' button. Additionally, the script was released subject to GFDL conditions, and LM cannot withdraw anyone's right to use it because he put it in the public domain. Ohconfucius (talk) 14:32, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

I thought we'd disposed of this notion above that "England" is not some little-known corner of the English-speaking world that needs to be linked. It is covered in WP:CONTEXT. Please realise that linking trivial items (in these terms) dilutes our wikilinking system; rather, we want to cleverly present the best links for readers, undiluted. As for the admin thing, I believe it would be most unfortunate (a breach of the conflict of interest policy) if such threats are being made, but I haven't looked into the details, so I can't form a judgement. Tony (talk) 14:40, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Small favor

Hi - the Help Desk says that you have a tool that switches date formats, could you run it by the Amelia Earhart article and switch the dates from d/m/y to m/d/y ? (I would do it myself, but I'm too lazy to do all of them one-by-one.) Thanks. AlexiusHoratius 18:16, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Resolved

 – Ohconfucius (talk) 19:54, 9 December 2008 (UTC)

Precisely the reason semi- and full automation has an increasing role to play at WP: we need to free up editors to do higher-level stuff. Tony (talk) 12:11, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Please stop

Plese stop removing the Baseball year template per WP:CONTEXT#Dates--Yankees10 15:02, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Sorry about that. I will stop delinking the baseball template (when it is not part of broken autoformatting). Thanks for letting me know. Lightmouse (talk) 15:28, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

No problem, sorry for reverting the whole thing--Yankees10 23:27, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

I don't mind you reverting. Many people think Wikipedia is generally overlinked and so needs a broad brush approach to delinking. The consequences of the broad brush can then be examined in detail as you have done. Keep up the good work. Lightmouse (talk) 09:58, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

See List of Canadian poets

I've been adding information to the List of Canadian poets article. Part of what I'm adding is links to years in poetry. This kind of linking can be useful, for instance, for someone trying to figure out the name of a particular poet when they know something else about that poet. The links are also useful for learning more about similar poets from the same period. Your bot has just removed all the links. Can you please prevent it from doing that? It's going to be one hell of a lot of work for me to restore that, since I can't just revert, having made edits since the bot struck. Could you prevent the bot from removing year-in-poetry links to any List-of-poets page? I see nothing at all in policy or guidelines that unequivocally supports removing these links, but if there is something, please point it out to me and I'll fight it out on whatever forum I need to, although we shouldn't need to fight this one out at all, since it seems pretty clear the links, in these circumstances, are useful. -- Reconsideration (talk) 15:08, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I was able to revert it. I've made these changes in a number of "List of [nationality] poets" articles, and I'd like them to stick. Do you disagree with that? -- Reconsideration (talk) 15:12, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

I am ok with your reverts. Wikipedia is generally overlinked and so needs a broad brush approach to delinking. Individual articles that get swept by the broad brush can then be examined in detail as you have done. Keep up the good work. Incidentally, have you considered the many comments that people have made at wt:mosnum about 'concealed links'? For example, those links look just like all other solitary year links and it might be worth making the reader aware that they are special. Lightmouse (talk) 15:24, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Your "broad brush", frenetic approach to delinking is harming the encyclopedia. Tennis expert (talk) 15:28, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

For example, those links look just like all other solitary year links and it might be worth making the reader aware that they are special. I agree. That's why the first line at List of Canadian poets states: This is a list of Canadian poets. Years link to corresponding "[year] in poetry" articles. I've also added similar statements to the "Births" and "Deaths" sections for about 200 of the "[year] in poetry" articles, where I'm linking those from year to year. Any year-in-foo-ness piped/hidden link in a list can be easily identified as a link to something other than the generic year article by a simple, short statement at the top of the list. WP style supports explanations for a list, particularly when there is something not obvious. I can revert when I catch something, but can you refrain in the future from making these removals from "List of ____ poets" articles? I'll take a look at that discussion. Thanks. -- Reconsideration (talk) 15:40, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Ah, I didn't see the bit at the top. I just saw the usual blue link for a 4 digit year. I will hold off for now (when it is not part of broken autoformatting) but please let me know what you think after reading the various discussions, many people have different ideas about how to re-sensitise people to date links after a long history of trained desensitisation. I am sure if you contributed to the debate, people would welcome your thoughts and respond. Lightmouse (talk) 15:52, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Thanks. I've been looking over that wt:mosnum page and looking at two different RfC pages but I'm not sure yet where to add my comments. Is there a specific section you were thinking of or should I just add a new section somewhere, and where? Thanks. -- Reconsideration (talk) 15:59, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

I think I found the spot: The "Year in field" discussions at the bottom of Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)/Date Linking RFC. When you're trying to find something, it always turns out to be in the last place you look. -- Reconsideration (talk) 16:03, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Thats it. Lightmouse (talk) 16:04, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

I added a proposal here: Wikipedia:Manual of Style (dates and numbers)/Date Linking RFC#Year-in-Field links in tables and lists are just fine but should be identified Thanks again for the suggestion. Reconsideration (talk) 17:07, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

So I see. It will be interesting to see what happens. Lightmouse (talk) 17:09, 10 December 2008 (UTC)

Child of the Prophecy

I don't understand your recent edit to this article. The year was correctly not linked to 2001 as specified in WP:MOS but linked to an article about the literature published in 2001, 2001 in literature. I know that there is a discussion underway regarding the linking of dates but there has not been a consensus and there has been no change to WP:MOS so I don't see a valid reason to remove this link. So, I would like to revert your recent edit.--Captain-tucker (talk) 14:24, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

The link looked like a solitary year and is likely to be treated like one i.e. ignored. Have you considered making the reader aware that it is different? In any case, I don't mind you putting it back. Lightmouse (talk) 18:02, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

It's a fairly common, if not an unwritten standard within the Wikipedia:WikiProject Novels community to link the year of publication to that year in literature for novel articles. I will revert it back. Thanks! --Captain-tucker (talk) 18:22, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Biography - Ray Joseph Cormier

I noticed you made a minor edit to my biography yesterday: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ray_Joseph_Cormier

There are a few Editors who have it on their watch list and within minutes of any change, scan what changes have been made. Since it is my biography, I have recused myself from making any edits except for adding references, and no one else has come forward to improve it.

One of those watchers has placed a tag on the article moments after your visit, which I interpret as an intention to delete if no other editors have a contrary POV.

Would you have an opinion to express here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_talk:Kingturtle? DoDaCanaDa (talk) 23:47, 11 December 2008 (UTC)

Please stop Lightbot until it's repaired

I see you've removed the braking mechanism from Lightbot but I thought you had repaired it so things like this wouldn't happen any more. The strong consensus is to not strip the useful "(year) in radio" tags to just the bare year! It's clear from the diff that Lightbot is still doing it, even after reassurances that it would no longer do so. Please stop the bot until you can affirm that it will no longer strip tags of this sort of their contents. - Dravecky (talk) 16:54, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

The format:

• [[April 11]], [[2005 in radio|2005]]

is broken. You are not unusual in being unaware of that, it is a popular misconception about date links. Lightmouse (talk) 17:03, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm well aware of the autoformatting issue and, as has been discussed many times, the proper fix is to remove the brackets from the month-day pair, not to strip the useful link to the year in radio (or in sports, in music, in television, etc.) This has been discussed ad nauseum and the consensus has been quite clear. - Dravecky (talk) 17:18, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

Lightmouse, there was a long and detailed discussion only a month ago about this exact issue (see Wikipedia:Administrators' noticeboard/Archive176#Lightbot — it's the fourth discussion on that page, in case the section link doesn't work), during which you stated that you would no longer make this exact type of edit. Several users, Dravecky and myself included, consented to the closing and archiving of the discussion having taken you at your word on this. Mlaffs (talk) 17:23, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

I have no objection if you remove autoformatting. Lightmouse (talk) 17:30, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

I'm sorry, but I'm not sure what you're saying with that statement. This isn't about asking if you're okay if we remove autoformatting. The bot is fixing broken autoformatting, by removing the valid contextual link. Three issues - first, if autoformatting is deprecated, why does broken autoformatting need to be "fixed"? Second, why would you feel that the deprecated autoformatting should take precedence over the valid contextual link? Third, and most important, why is the bot making edits like these again when you said that it would no longer do so? Mlaffs (talk) 17:39, 12 December 2008 (UTC)

I will try to answer your questions one by one:

• Autoformatting is indeed deprecated. It can be absent or it can be present. But it shouldn't be present *and* broken.
• I am not running a test for precedence. I am fixing an error.
• I said that I would stop fixing these errors because I got frustrated. I am no longer frustrated. I see these errors still exist so I decided to start fixing the errors again.

If you want to fix the errors in your own way, that is fine by me. These errors should not have been created. When you revert these edits you are recreating the error. I find it hard to be persuaded that errors should not be fixed. Lightmouse (talk) 17:51, 12 December 2008 (UTC)